Fires should serve as wake-up call

My first real experience with fire in my woods, the Pinelands of New Jersey, was at the age of 12. On April 20, 1963, South Jersey experienced "Black Saturday," when wildfires burned 183,000 acres of woodland.

That fall, when my father told us that we would hunt deer on the "burnt ground," I was confused. I thought Black Saturday had destroyed all the forests and the deer, as depicted in the film Bambi. But my father, who had hunted the area since the 1930s, knew about fire. He explained that deer are attracted to recently burnt areas because of all the fresh growth that they need to browse on.

I learned two valuable lessons: One, fire can be good for hunting and wildlife. Two, fire changes forests. Always has, always will.

Fast-forward to the summer of 1975, when I was working for the Washington State Department of Natural Resources as a wildland fire crew boss fighting wild fires in the Skagit Valley in western Washington. It was not long before I experienced a wildfire that raced up the side of a mountain, out of control.

As I watched and participated in the suppression of that fire, I quickly understood how seriously the people in charge viewed fire. There was no mistake: Fire was the enemy, and it was to be attacked and put out as soon as possible. The people asked to fight it were risking their lives, but saving lives and property was our priority.

Ten years later, I was a forester in the New Jersey Pinelands - then officially the Pinelands National Reserve, where land use was regulated by a state commission. This designation meant that there was a plan in place to protect the ecological integrity of the region, one that recognized fire's role in forest management.

As I began to work in some of the very forest I had seen burn during my boyhood, with the idea of sustaining the ecology of a forest with fire, my view of fire changed dramatically. Can a burnt-out forest be a good thing? Yes, but it depends on several factors.

Fire clearly is on society's mind now. In fact, it is the center of attention because of the tragic loss of 19 of our nation's best wildland firefighters on June 30 in Arizona. These deaths should serve as a wake-up call for all of us.

Tens of millions of acres of forest need restoration, according to Tom Tidwell, chief of the U.S. Forest Service. And the problem isn't limited to the Western states alone. How best to achieve that restoration in such a wide variety of forests is complex, with no one-size-fits-all solution.

There are clear sides on the fire issue. One group says, "Let it burn; then, don't touch it." The other side argues, "Salvage dead and dying trees, replant, and then thin to prevent fire and promote forest health." But the answer is not either-or, it's all of the above. It's a matter of when, where, and how.

Trying to control fire is not the issue. This is about learning to live with fire.

In May, I had the privilege of hosting Stephen Pyne, a national authority on fire. His latest essay - "Bog and Burn: the Paradoxes of the New Jersey Pinelands," at http://firehistory.asu.edu - looks at how the Pinelands may provide an example of how society can deal with fire across the nation.

In his essay, Pyne warns of what could come, and notes an important difference between the Pinelands of 50 years ago and of today, chiefly that now there are thousands of homes near the forest. "Sooner or later, southern New Jersey will know the fire equivalent of Hurricane Sandy or worse," he wrote.

Does the political and social will to address this issue exist? Has the nation learned anything from the fires in the West and the recent loss of 19 firefighters? Is South Jersey prepared to properly manage the Pinelands? Will it be ready should "Black Saturday" strike again?